Tag: Pay it Forward

Today I did something good for somebody else. An acquaintance of mine sadly missed her hired bus out of town and felt a little lost in the situation. I advised her to catch a public bus going to the central station where from she could catch another bus heading to her destination. As a favour I pulled out one of two travel passes from my wallet and handed it over. The pass would take her to her destination. As the pass would still be valuable as she would reach her destination, she asked if she should send it back to me. Whereto I answered: “Give it to some lucky stranger when you arrive”.

Alright it is not the matter of life and death and we talk a favour only worth a few dollars, but it still reminded me of a concept presented in a movie I had seen just a few years previously. The name of the movie is called “Pay It Forward”. You might have seen it, and the concept is in general fairly simple.

Instead of returning a favour you should pay it forward.

The travel pass I had received from a friend as he was leaving and it would no longer be valuable to him. It was valuable to me until today, where it became more valuable for somebody else. Considering this movement, four people have already had the benefit of one man’s generosity, followed by another man’s generosity, followed by another woman’s generosity and who knows? Maybe the movement will continue.

The same concept is presented in the movie and in theory the concept should be up for solving major problems of humanity. It is a noble thought and we can only encourage us self and our surroundings to be helpful to one another, believing that one favour will return in another favour paid forward to somebody else.